The Lucas Museum of Narrative Art - Chicago (2018)

George Lucas has not made a final decision about whether Chicago will be home to the museum. Lucas’ hometown of San Francisco remains in the running.

Mayor Rahm Emanuel gave a dozen civic leaders one month to find an accessible site in Chicago that’s large enough to house a museum “comparable to other major cultural institutions” that does not “require taxpayer dollars.”

The marching orders did not rule out building the Lucas Cultural Arts Museum on park district land along the lakefront in a leasing arrangement similar to other lakefront museums. In fact, top mayoral aide David Spielfogel opened the door to that possibility by saying, “We’re not offering taxpayer funds, but we might do a lease like other nonprofits get.”

Late Monday, the task force met with Emanuel to recommend a site that is as certain to delight the movie mogul as it is to stir controversy among lakefront preservationists.

Sources said the panel recommended that the Lucas Museum be built on a parking lot at Chicago’s museum campus alongside the Field Museum, the Shedd Aquarium and the Adler Planetarium.

Sources said the museum campus was chosen after Lucas met privately with the site selection committee to outline his vision for the museum, warehouse, art collection and endowment with a combined value of $1 billion.

The Star Wars creator, who is married to Chicago businesswoman Mellody Hobson, said he wanted his museum to be close to water, enveloped by nature and centrally-located. He talked about enhancing the green space around it by taking much of the museum parking underground.

Lucas’ “must-haves” made the museum campus the logical choice — particularly after Meigs Field and sites under consideration for President Barack Obama’s library and museum were eliminated, sources said.

“This guy really wants to do this [in Chicago]. San Francisco hogtied him that much. And this site really is the best Chicago has to offer,” said a source close to the negotiations.

“You’ve got the Adler, the Shedd and the Field all right there,” the source said. “This would add another crown jewel. You could literally create a one-day super-pass that would allow families with kids to hopscotch from one museum to the other with picnics in between.”

Another source acknowledged that the museum campus site would be controversial as lakefront projects inevitably are. But it represents Chicago’s best chance to fend off stiff competition from Lucas’ home town of San Francisco, the source said.

“He didn’t come in here and say, `I want to re-gentrify a blighted area.’ That’s not what this is about. He wants to be near water and part of nature,” the source said.

“Can you imagine Chicago without the Planetarium or the Shedd? This is another crown jewel. It would be stupid for the city to let a chance at something like this slip away. If you look at that [museum campus] parking lot now, it looks disgusting. This would be a vast improvement.”

Lucas originally wanted to build the 95,000-square-foot Lucas Cultural Arts Museum on one of the most breathtaking sites in San Francisco: Crissy Field on the Army base-turned-national park known as the Presidio.

But when the trust that oversees the federal land rejected all three proposals for that site in February and its chairwoman criticized the Lucas museum design as “inappropriate” and “too big,” Chicago emerged as a potential front-runner.

Lucas Museum spokesman David Perry has described the project as the “history of storytelling” and the “world’s foremost museum dedicated to the power of the visual image.”

The core of the collection will be “illustrative artwork of the last 150 years,” including works by Norman Rockwell, Maxfield Parrish and Joseph Christian Leyendecker, whose works adorned the covers of the Saturday Evening Post and started Lucas “on his artistic path.”

But the museum will also include cinematic offerings, film design, fashion, special effects, children’s book and comic book illustrations.

“When you look at George Lucas’ career and interests, he’s a man who has broken boundaries and discovered and invented things people didn’t think of before. This museum is bound to capture that and be a museum like no other. There aren’t museums looking at digital art and the art of storytelling like this. It’s a fantastic opportunity for Chicago.”

The billionaire filmmaker is offering to pour his own fortune into a Lucas Cultural Arts Museum to house his personal collection. While San Francisco is courting the California native with prime waterfront real estate, so is Chicago.

“It’s a healthy competition,” Tony Winnicker, senior adviser to San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee, said by telephone. “It’s hundreds of millions of dollars of private investment to build a public museum, cultural center and education center. Those don’t come along very often, and when they do, you’ve got to put up every effort to keep it in your city.”

Mayor Rahm Emanuel of Chicago, the hometown of Lucas’s wife, Mellody Hobson, formed a task force last month to offer a potential location after federal officials rejected Lucas’s proposal to put the museum in a national park overlooking the Golden Gate Bridge. In response, Lee has told his staff to prepare a proposal for Lucas by the end of the month.

The Chicago panel this week recommended 17 acres along the Lake Michigan shoreline, more than 1,800 miles (2,900 kilometers) from San Francisco Bay. The Windy City site is currently a parking lot between Soldier Field, home of the National Football League’s Chicago Bears, and McCormick Place, the nation’s largest convention center.

“It’s a win-win for the City of Chicago, for our neighborhoods and for George and Mellody Lucas to see Chicago as their home for this great museum,” Emanuel said May 20 at a news conference. “And it will help us drive the type of tourism and convention industry that we want to see.”

The land is owned by the Chicago Park District and is near three major tourist attractions -- the Field Museum, the Shedd Aquarium and the Adler Planetarium.

San Francisco last week took Lucas’s team to prospective sites in the Mid-Market district, home to Twitter Inc. (TWTR), and at the foot of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge near the Ferry Building. The second site, owned by the Port of San Francisco, is near AT&T Park, the home of Major League Baseball’s San Francisco Giants.

“Any big city that has a chance to have a museum of that caliber would want to have it,” said Ford Bell, president of the Washington-based American Alliance of Museums.

The Lucas museum was one of three finalists for a site in the Presidio known as Crissy Field, an open area popular with joggers and families facing the Golden Gate and San Francisco Bay. All three proposals were rejected in February.

Lucas has been offered an alternative spot near Lucasfilm’s offices and hasn’t yet responded, said Dana Polk, a spokeswoman for the Presidio Trust.

A third contender for the museum is Oakland, California, across the bay from San Francisco. Oakland Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan wrote to Lucas on March 5 inviting him to consider a site now occupied by the Henry J. Kaiser Convention Center.

“I am excited to inform you that your dream could be a reality in Oakland,” Kaplan said in the letter.

San Francisco will make a formal proposal based on discussions with Lucas’s team by the end of the month, Winnicker said.

Chicago’s push for the museum is “to be expected,” Winnicker said. “Any city and any mayor are going to covet this level of private investment by one of the world’s best-known filmmakers.”

The Lucas Museum of Narrative Art (LMNA) is honored to be partnering with the city of Chicago and the many cultural, civic and community groups that will work with the Museum. Public outreach and educational programming are central to the mission and public service goals of the Museum. The LMNA will support the stunning innovations of the digital age while emphasizing the same values that distinguish Chicago from other great cities: community involvement, diversity, and a commitment to excellence in art, architecture, and creativity.

Lucas Museum of Narrative Art to Call Chicago Home

CHICAGO (June 24) – The Lucas Museum of Narrative Art (LMNA) announced today that it intends to join Chicago’s vibrant cultural arts scene by locating on the city’s Museum Campus. LMNA will be a gathering place to experience narrative art and the evolution of the visual image – from illustration to cinema to digital arts.

“We are honored to be partnering with the city of Chicago and the many cultural, educational and community groups that have come forward with ideas about how the LMNA will add to their work,” said George Lucas, the Museum’s founder. “I am humbled to be joining such an extraordinary museum community and to be creating the Museum in a city that has a long tradition of embracing the arts and architecture.”

“George Lucas has revolutionized the art of storytelling over the last four decades and we are honored to be the recipient of this incredible legacy investment that will allow everyone to learn about and experience narrative arts,” said Mayor Rahm Emanuel. “Like Marshall Field, John G. Shedd and Max Adler before him, George’s philanthropy will inspire and educate for generations. No other museum like this exists in the world, making it a tremendous educational, cultural and job creation asset for all Chicagoans, as well as an unparalleled draw for international tourists.”

The LMNA, previously known as the Lucas Cultural Arts Museum, chose Chicago because of the quality of the site proposed by the city’s task force. The 17-acre site offers unparalleled visitor access. “Choosing Chicago is the right decision for the Museum, but a difficult decision for me personally because of my strong personal and professional roots in the Bay Area,” said Mr. Lucas, a native of Modesto, Ca. “I thank all Californians who reached out to me in support of the Museum.

The Museum’s location, proposed by a task force appointed by Mayor Emanuel, was selected based on its accessibility to public transportation, ease of access from all parts of the city, potential to create significant new green space, and its ability to accommodate an iconic structure. The LMNA will transform the site by moving the existing parking spaces underground and replacing acres of asphalt with more parkland along the harbor. Architectural renderings for the proposed site will be presented to the City of Chicago in early fall.

“It is a great privilege for the Museum to be a custodian of this cherished land,” said Mr. Lucas, who hopes to open the LMNA in 2018.

Architectural Team Selected to Design the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art

Following a global search, the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art (LMNA) announced today that Beijing-based MAD Architects has been selected as the principal designer for the LMNA site while Chicago-based Studio Gang will design the landscape and create a bridge to connect the LMNA to Northerly Island. VOA Associates, based in Chicago, will serve as the executive architect and lead the implementation of MAD’s design.

“We are bringing together some of the top architects in the world to ensure that our museum experience begins long before a visitor ever enters the building,” said George Lucas, founder of the LMNA. “I am thrilled with the architectural team’s vision for the building and the surrounding green space. I look forward to presenting our design to the Chicago community.”

The LMNA considered several different architects from around the globe. MAD Architects was chosen because of its innovative approach to design and the firm’s philosophy of connecting urban spaces to natural landscapes. Amsterdam-based UNStudio was the runner-up for the principal design role.

Ma Yansong, the founder of MAD Architects, will be responsible for the design and overall concept of the LMNA building. In seeking to connect the interior and exterior worlds, Mr. Ma has designed some of the most innovative buildings in the world including Absolute Towers in Ontario, Canada, the Ordos Museum in Ordos, China and Chaoyang Park Plaza in Beijing, China.

“It is a gift to be able to design the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art in a city so rich with architectural history,” said Mr. Ma, a graduate of the Yale School of Architecture. “I am humbled and honored to be given this opportunity to create a timeless design that moves and inspires people just like Mr. Lucas’ collection.”

To connect the LMNA to neighboring Northerly Island, a bridge will be built by the LMNA, at no cost to the City of Chicago. Jeanne Gang, who has spent the past four years transforming Northerly Island from an airport runway to an oasis of greenery, will design the bridge and lead the landscape design for the LMNA.

“We are excited to build upon our current work and collaborate to create a seamless transition between the Museum Campus and Northerly Island,” said Ms. Gang, a MacArthur Fellow. “In keeping with the Northerly Island ethos, our design goal will be to create a combined ecological and urban habitat.”

VOA Associates, whose designs include Roosevelt University’s 32-story vertical campus in downtown Chicago and the Swedish Embassy in Washington, D.C., will implement Mr. Ma’s design. “We will take the concept design and create a digital sculpture that will serve as the blueprint for construction,” said Michael Toolis, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, VOA Associates. “Each aspect of the museum will be digitally created using technology that enables us to test daylight, create interactive models and examine how the design performs in different environments.”

The design for the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art will be introduced in late 2014.

The Lucas Museum of Narrative Art announced today that its Board of Directors has named Don Bacigalupi as the Museum’s Founding President, effective Jan. 15. Bacigalupi joins the Lucas Museum with more than 20 years of experience in collection and exhibition development, museum management, and educational programming. Initially, Bacigalupi will focus on the planning, organization and construction of the Museum.

“Don shares my vision for building an education-focused, world-class museum that expands public understanding and appreciation of narrative art,” said George Lucas, Founder and Chairman of the Lucas Museum. “Don’s decades of experience include a proven track record for building a museum from inception, and he recognizes that community partnerships and multidimensional programming are critical to ensuring a museum’s long-term impact.”

Most recently, Bacigalupi served as the President of the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas. He joined the museum as Executive Director in 2009 and was instrumental in developing all aspects of the museum prior to its opening in 2011— from building its staff and collection to facilities and programming. Bacigalupi will remain a member on the Crystal Bridges Board of Directors.

“I am honored and excited to be joining the Lucas Museum as its Founding President, and I look forward to working with George and the Board to bring to life an inspiring museum that will expand our awareness and appreciation of the central role of narrative art in our culture,” said Bacigalupi. “My hope is that the Lucas Museum will educate and engage millions of visitors of all ages and backgrounds to explore new creative frontiers. I'm eager to collaborate with Chicago's many outstanding cultural institutions as we work to create an unprecedented experience for residents and visitors alike.”

Prior to joining Crystal Bridges, Bacigalupi served as President, Director and CEO of the Toledo Museum of Art, where he oversaw the construction and development of its world-renowned Glass Pavilion. He previously served as the Executive Director of the San Diego Museum of Art.

Bacigalupi earned his master’s and doctorate degrees in art history from the University of Texas at Austin, and he received a bachelor’s degree in art history from the University of Houston, where he was valedictorian of his class. Bacigalupi has served on the boards of numerous organizations, including the Association of Art Museum Directors and the National Committee of the International Council of Museums. A seasoned lecturer both domestically and abroad, he has been the recipient of numerous honors and awards and was a 1996 fellow at the Getty Trust.

Last summer, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti made a vigorous push to get George Lucas to choose L.A., but the city lost out to Chicago.

"We still have to get through some lawsuits and things in Chicago," Lucas said.

"Once we make it through, we'll be on our way. But it's still a possibility that Chicago will be unable to do it," Lucas said.

"I have faith in Chicago and Mayor Rahm Emanuel, who is dedicated to making it happen," Lucas said. "But he's also coming up for election next month."

"The advantage Los Angeles has is that it's on the USC campus and I don't have to go through all the rigmarole of years and years of trying to get past everything," Lucas said. "That's an advantage because I do want to get it done in my lifetime."

The Illinois Legislature approved a bill Thursday to ensure that Chicago has legal authority to use public park land as potential sites for Barack Obama's presidential library and film producer George Lucas' proposed museum.

The legislation clarifies state law to expressly allow Chicago to construct museums on public park land or "formerly submerged lands."

Gov. Bruce Rauner signed legislation Friday to strengthen the city’s legal ability to build the project on public park land.

Despite a galaxy of concerns surrounding the building of “Star Wars” creator George Lucas’ museum, Gov. Rauner’s legislative move changes Illinois law to let Chicago build museums on park or “formerly submerged” land. The Lake Michigan-adjacent property where Lucas wants to build – which currently acts as a parking lot south of Soldier Field – is part of land belonging to Chicago’s Museum Campus community. The Lucas Museum site is in close proximity to the Field Museum, Shedd Aquarium, Adler Planetarium and Northerly Island.

The Lucas Museum of Narrative Art announced today that in light of extensive delays caused by Friends of the Parks, Chicago will no longer be considered a potential site for the museum. The board of directors and executive leadership of the museum confirmed that California will be its future home.

“No one benefits from continuing their seemingly unending litigation to protect a parking lot,” said George W. Lucas, founder and chairman of the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art. “The actions initiated by Friends of the Parks and their recent attempts to extract concessions from the city have effectively overridden approvals received from numerous democratically elected bodies of government.”

The location — a parking lot near Soldier Field — was originally selected by Chicago’s Site Selection Task Force in May 2014 and subsequently approved by the City Council, Park District, Plan Commission, Department of Zoning, Illinois General Assembly and the governor. When the city offered McCormick Place East as an alternative to the parking lot, Friends of the Parks announced plans to block consideration of that location as well as any lakefront site or park in Chicago.

On behalf of his wife, Mellody Hobson, and other members of the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art Board of Directors, Mr. Lucas expressed gratitude to the many people throughout the community who worked tirelessly to bring the institution to life on Chicago’s Museum Campus. "We are deeply appreciative to Mayor Rahm Emanuel, Governor Bruce Rauner and countless others for all the time and effort they invested in trying to secure the museum for Chicago," said Mr. Lucas.

The education-focused public institution remains dedicated to expanding public understanding and appreciation of narrative art in all its forms, providing inspiration and learning, especially for young people.

Mr. Lucas stated, “While Chicago will not be home to the museum, my wife and I will continue to enthusiastically support a wide variety of educational and cultural activities throughout the city.”

The Lucas Museum of Narrative Art announced today that it has named former U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan to its board of directors, effective June 1.

“We are honored that Secretary Duncan will lend his many talents, deep experience and remarkable insights to the museum. His passion for innovative solutions and commitment to equity make him particularly well-suited for the museum's educational and cultural mission,” said George Lucas, founder and chairman of the Lucas Museum.

Duncan joins the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art’s board just months after stepping down as U.S. Secretary of Education under President Barack Obama. Prior to his confirmation as secretary of education, Duncan served as the chief executive officer of Chicago Public Schools (CPS), and from 1992 to 1998, he led the Ariel Education Initiative. Duncan was raised in Hyde Park and from an early age has been active in promoting educational opportunities for children on the South Side of Chicago.

“I cannot think of anyone more authentic, more committed and devoted to young people than Arne Duncan,” said Mellody Hobson, president of Ariel Investments and member of the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art’s board. “Arne shares our vision for creating a world-class institution that connects, inspires and educates diverse communities. We are very fortunate to have him join the board.”

Mr. Duncan said, “I am delighted to have the opportunity to join the board of this truly exceptional nonprofit museum and to have the opportunity to work with pioneers like George and Mellody. This museum will inspire the next generation of artists and storytellers.”

The saga of George Lucas’ search for a site to build his museum already has had more plot twists than a summer blockbuster.

Now comes the strangest twist of all: If the billionaire filmmaker does turn his attention back to the Bay Area, as The Chronicle reported Sunday, and presents an imaginative vision for San Francisco’s Treasure Island that emphasizes transportation every bit as much as architecture, it actually might turn out to be a force for good.

Good, as in a boost for the region’s transportation system. Good, as in the addition of a museum of popular culture to balance our more recent high-minded fare, such as the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. And good, as in a chance for the Marin resident to show that his cinematic flair can translate to urban architecture that feels like it belongs.

Roundabout journey

That last task has stymied Lucas, who sought to build his museum in the Presidio across from Crissy Field, only to head to Chicago in 2014 when the Presidio Trust (wisely) declined his offer. Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel then worked all the political levers to clear the way for Lucas to make his mark on the shore of Lake Michigan, but a federal lawsuit by park advocates has put it on hold for the indefinite future.

Because of that logjam, Lucas representatives have held preliminary talks with Mayor Ed Lee and two supervisors about making room for the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art on Treasure Island as part of a huge redevelopment effort just starting to get under way.

If, like me, you saw Lucas’ watered-down version of the Palace of Fine Arts at Crissy Field as a bad building in a magical location, this isn’t necessarily a good thing. It didn’t help that the proposed museum was an ill-defined grab bag ranging from Norman Rockwell paintings to vintage film props to contemporary digital animation.

But when Lucas turned his attention to Chicago, he shifted architectural styles to embrace a futuristic approach led by the well-regarded Chinese architect Ma Yansong. The thrust of the museum has been sharpened to emphasize the art of storytelling, with a focus missing during the Crissy Field competition.

In other words, the filmmaker has shown a willingness to evolve and alter his plans. And the most likely site — land around the existing chapel near the entrance to the island and facing the city — offers the chance for distinctive, high-visibility architecture that wouldn’t intrude on such planned public resources as a huge waterfront park.

Ferries aren’t cheap

The big issue, of course, is how to get an estimated 500,000-plus museum visitors each year to and from an island that currently can only be reached by vehicle from the Bay Bridge. But it’s also the one that Lucas could use to captivate skeptics.

Ferry service already is planned between the Ferry Building and a new terminal that would be built near the chapel and the historic, concave Building 1, one of the few remnants from the 1939 Golden Gate International Exposition. The terminal could debut as early as 2021, not long after the first new buildings open in what eventually is conceived as a self-sufficient neighborhood of 8,000 apartments and condominiums.

Imagine if part of Lucas’ proposal were to buy and operate at least two ferries — one connecting Treasure Island to the Ferry Building, the other serving the East Bay from Oakland’s Jack London Square. Such service could be part of the museum’s ticketed experience, similar to the current link between Pier 35 and Alcatraz. There’d be no point in families or “Star Wars” geeks navigating the already molasses-like Bay Bridge, solving a huge potential problem.

Expensive? Yes. The 400-passenger vessels that will be purchased in coming years by the agency that oversees the ferry system, the San Francisco Bay Area Water Emergency Transportation Authority, cost roughly $16 million each. But that’s a manageable part of the overall $300 million budget that Lucas was estimating for his Crissy Field museum — one that included visitor parking, which wouldn’t be needed here. His estimated budget now runs to $700 million.

This would make a unique form of transportation integral to a museum that already bills itself as “unlike any other.”

As for the architecture, what counts isn’t style so much as skill and execution.

Design over dazzle

If Lucas wants to look toward the past for architectural cues, as was the case at the Presidio, that can work. If he wants to go in a contemporary or futuristic direction, as he did in Chicago, that can work, too. The important thing is to hire good architects who understand the virtues of well-crafted structures, so that — like first-rate special effects in a movie — we’re seduced by the experience.

Any talks with San Francisco are at an early stage. Chicago’s mayor might pull off a last-minute coup that makes Lake Michigan work. It might be that Los Angeles turns Lucas’ head. Opposition might arise here once there’s an actual design to look at. That’s always the most important test.

Still, it’s telling that Lucas has conditional support from Supervisors Aaron Peskin and Jane Kim. The former is a past critic of Treasure Island’s redevelopment. The latter is the island’s supervisor.

“The museum could give Treasure Island a heart and a destination,” Peskin said Monday, adding that he’s hopeful there might be a conceptual agreement by the end of the month on whether a formal proposal might emerge.

I asked Peskin whether he’s lured in part by Lucas’ celebrity status.

“My only claim to ‘Star Wars’ fame is that I saw the original at the Coronet Theater when it came out” in 1977, Peskin said. “For the record, I thought ‘American Graffiti’ was his best film.”

An exclusive first look at the collection of the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art

Illustrations : The Lucas Museum of Narrative Art.

Just inside the gate of the George Lucas estate in San Anselmo is a small guest house, a pristine reproduction of a Craftsman-style bungalow. In its illusionistic accuracy and warm oaken glow, it seems the perfect metaphor for a way of seeing the world to which many of us were introduced in Lucas’ breakout movie, “American Graffiti.”

Leaning against the walls and sprawled on tables is a selection of 55 original drawings and paintings, as well as eight thick notebooks containing more than 700 photographic reproductions of works in Lucas’ art collection. All are slated to become part of the first holdings — the Seed Collection — of the long-planned Lucas Museum of Narrative Art.

Guiding me through the images, which were brought here just for our meeting, is Don Bacigalupi, the museum’s founding president and a much-credentialed art historian and museum director. Bacigalupi says the museum will eventually have its pick of the rest of the collection — about 10,000 paintings and works on paper and 30,000 film-related objects — that the renowned filmmaker has assembled over a period of 40 years and that is still growing.

It seems nearly everyone has an opinion about the collection of the Lucas Museum, which made Bacigalupi its first professional staff member last year. “It’s a ‘Star Wars’ museum,” some have said. “It’s a Hollywood memorabilia museum.” On Twitter, Los Angeles Times art critic Christopher Knight called it “George Lucas’ planned Treacle Museum.” But who has actually seen the collection? Only a few people, says Bacigalupi — and no journalist. Until now.

Having had the first opportunity to evaluate the collection, I am glad to say it is none of those things. In fact, it may just be the core of a great museum.

Lucas has been attempting to build his eponymous museum since at least 2010, with widely publicized false starts at San Francisco’s Crissy Field and, later, on a lakefront site in Chicago. In June, he canceled the Chicago plan; his team is once again in discussions for a San Francisco site, this time on Treasure Island. They are also talking with officials in Los Angeles.

The San Francisco bid is likely to go better this time. The site is one that was already designated for a cultural use in a recent Treasure Island master plan. It has broad backing: Both key members of the Board of Supervisors and Mayor Ed Lee have voiced support, the mayor’s press office confirms. The museum’s architectural design promises to be much improved over the first proposal.

Classic Stories and Illustrators

The stories we were told, the first books we read and the images we grew to love as children are part of who we are today; many themes appear generation after generation.

Illustrations : The Lucas Museum of Narrative Art.

Illustrations : The Lucas Museum of Narrative Art.

But there’s another crucial element that bodes success: a much greater attention to communicating the cultural, social and historic value of the collection as an artifact and an unparalleled resource. This time, it’s about the art.

Key decisions made over the past year began with a change of name, from the confusing Cultural Arts Museum to the more descriptive Museum of Narrative Art. The project has acquired some of the significant trappings of any serious museum, with an informative website and a qualified board that includes the founder and prominent educators, museum professionals and business executives. In hiring Bacigalupi, the museum landed a strategic thinker about art and audience, and an articulate spokesman for the institution’s mission and raison d’etre; he will soon be joined by a new director of curatorial strategies and a director of film strategies.

Bacigalupi, a colleague from the days I was a museum director, has a doctorate in art history and has had a distinguished career as director of some classic museums (San Diego Museum of Art, Toledo Museum of Art). He also worked with the strong-minded, fabulously wealthy Alice Walton to develop and build the widely praised Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Ark., which opened in 2011.

He calls the work he did with Walton and is now pursuing with Lucas — and a new central player, Mellody Hobson, whom Lucas married in 2013 — “the act of translating the vision ... from a founder to a viable institution that can actually work.”

All the discussion of the proposed museum’s architecture and siting has been well placed, but it is beside the point if its core institutional idea falls flat. Bacigalupi grants that the first building designs started from the outside. “It was a little cart-before-the-horse,” he allows.

So, what is the Lucas’ vision? Will it further enhance the Bay Area’s already extraordinary cultural assets? And do we really need such an institution?

delved into the collection records over two long visits and spent additional hours over several days in discussion with the new president about what is in place and what is planned. I came away believing that no other city in the United States would be a better setting, intellectually and artistically, for the Lucas Museum.

American Life

Documentation and interpretation of American life and mores is a frequent collection focus. Even idealized and sentimental narratives reveal something about how we want our world to be, how we wish to be depicted.

Illustrations : The Lucas Museum of Narrative Art.

Illustrations : The Lucas Museum of Narrative Art.

“Narrative art is, simply stated, visual art that tells a story,” Bacigalupi says. “It manifests itself in every kind of medium, in every culture, in every form that you can imagine.”

That’s clear enough in concept, but making a museum collection out of it would be a daunting challenge. It would start with cave drawings and go on from there, encompassing all but the abstract and the purely symbolic. But there is a more focused idea: a mission, really, to provide an alternative to the current institutional view of what is worthy of preservation and study as art. In terms of the Bay Area, I see the Lucas Museum as a critical enhancement of the work of our many existing museums and public galleries, and not at all duplicative.

“The museum world has often ignored ... some of the most compelling narrative art forms,” Bacigalupi argues. “So they tend to be relegated to the status of low art, or popular art or media art — all the binaries that we set up with ‘high’ and ‘low,’ and ‘popular’ and ‘fine.’”

In the 20th century, he says, “the most popular arena for storytelling in visual form has been things like film and illustration and comics and animation. ... Instead of us getting into that debate about what is art and what isn’t art, the museum really doesn’t pay attention to that capital “A” Art, and instead looks for this through line, this continuity in whatever form, whatever context, whatever medium ... for this very basic human impulse: to tell stories.”

The Great Themes

From a full set of 207 original drawings for “The Book of Genesis” as re-told by Zap Comix artist R. Crumb, to a set of 23 interpretations of “Aesop’s Fables” by the great Jacob Lawrence, to Keith Haring’s obsessive rumination on “The Last Rainforest,” the collection reflects concerns of deep cultural significance.

Illustrations : The Lucas Museum of Narrative Art.

There has long been academic scholarship on popular art forms, particularly film, but serious consideration in museums has been slower to develop. In this country, I can think of three very credible institutions that have taken on aspects of the task — the Brandywine River Museum in Chadds Ford, Pa., near the longtime home of the Wyeth family; the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, Mass.; and the Wolfsonian, a museum of design and propaganda at Florida International University in Miami.

But none of those are as broad-based in mission as the intended Lucas Museum, or have the resources — Lucas plans to spend more than $1 billion — it can bring to the effort. Nor are they embedded in the broader art museum context San Francisco provides.

To describe even part of the Lucas Seed Collection is to make a very long list. There’s a nascent photography collection that, frankly, needs work. There is also a vast Arts of Filmmaking portion that would require its own catalog, including costume designs and costumes, storyboard drawings, set paintings and objects from such iconic films as “The Wizard of Oz,” “Casablanca,” “The Ten Commandments” and “Star Wars.” Though movies will be shown at the museum regularly, film itself will not enter the collection; these objects have been assembled because they are invaluable in studying the creation of narrative. Telling the story of story-making, so to speak.

As significant as the film-related objects may be, I looked most closely at materials like original watercolor, pen and ink, and painted illustrations from the children’s books that were our (and our parents’ and grandparents’) first exposure to literature. An 1864 Sir John Tenniel drawing from “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland”; classic works by Kate Greenaway (1846-1901) and Beatrix Potter (1866-1943); Arthur Rackham’s jewel-like, anthropomorphic depictions of animal life at the turn of the last century; Jean de Brunhoff’s original “Babar” drawings from the 1930s.

The Graphic Narrative

The most inventive comic strips of a hundred years ago likely provided inspiration to the Surrealists; in pencil and ink, graphic narrative artists provide a gateway to an otherwise inaccessible world of absurdly effective contraptions, space travel, dreams and nightmares.

Illustrations : The Lucas Museum of Narrative Art.

The value of these materials goes beyond their rarity as objects. Even — no, especially — with all their outmoded preconceptions and prejudices, they are the irreplaceable source of our view, literally, of the world. To study them for the beliefs that artists and publishers meant to inculcate in us is to understand ourselves more deeply.

And then there are the social documents that were coded in other ways, epitomized by the images of social harmony and responsibility for which Norman Rockwell became so famous and beloved. Lucas’ Rockwell holding of 147 works continues to grow, even since the auction-record-setting addition of the artist’s most important painting, “Saying Grace” (1951) — a work that, in terms of emotional impact, is among the most significant of all magazine cover illustrations.

The Lucas Museum collection is a study in contrasts. The society that embraced the Saturday Evening Post illustrator’s moralism emerged, confoundingly, from an age that loved Maxfield Parrish’s worldly, even libertine portrayal of the way things are, or might be. Parrish is represented by 41 original works.

There are, of course, many works by artists embraced by mainstream institutions. A series of 23 drawings by Jacob Lawrence related to “Aesop’s Fables” (1969) is a case in point. The museum is actively collecting, its perspective broadened by Hobson, who, even before she joined the board, was building a personal collection of contemporary art with an emphasis on African American artists. Recently added are prints by Kara Walker and an important painting by Keith Haring, two artists whose narrative acuity is indisputable. They join works by a broad range of artists from Ingres to Frida Kahlo to Rirkrit Tiravanija.

The boy in me has a nostalgic connection to the paintings (by at least six different illustrators) for Mad magazine covers, and the drawings for comic characters like Uncle Scrooge by Carl Barks (1901-2000), Little Lulu by Marge Buell (1904-1993) and, best of all, Al Capp’s (1909-1979) Li’l Abner. There are superheroes, from Captain America to Batman, not to mention newspaper strip mockups for Little Orphan Annie, Dick Tracy, Pogo, Peanuts, Doonesbury and many others. And drawings for animated film: “Dumbo,” “Sleeping Beauty,” “Bambi,” “Cinderella,” “Peter Pan,” “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.”

Stories in Draft

An important area of the collection consists of sketches and models. They represent the origins and thinking behind influential cultural landmarks in art, whether on canvas, the printed page or — an unsurprisingly rich vein in a collection founded by George Lucas - film.

Illustrations : The Lucas Museum of Narrative Art.

It is a seemingly inexhaustible stockpile of invention and fantasy. But, as surrealist compositions of the highest order, nothing approaches the visual and conceptual heights of Winsor McCay’s “Little Nemo” reveries and George Herriman’s “Krazy Kat” antics. The wealth of detail in these early-20th century graphic short stories required oversize sheets, 2 feet high and almost as wide.

The majesty of the Bible itself is encompassed by an extraordinary recent acquisition, and it may be the best bridge to understanding the potential value of the Lucas Museum.

Robert Crumb of Zap Comix fame undertook a five-year effort to hand-letter and draw all 50 chapters of the Book of Genesis, “a text so great and so strange,” he says, that he tells the story straight. Exhibited at the Venice Biennale in 2009, the year it was completed, the monumental series was most recently presented in a major exhibition at the Seattle Art Museum, alongside the work of five other “graphic masters”: Dürer, Rembrandt, Hogarth, Goya and Picasso.

Exhibition curator Chiyo Ishikawa, the Seattle museum’s deputy director for art, said she had seen the Crumb piece in Venice and never doubted its inclusion among works by some of the greatest artists through history.

“We had the printmaking audience and also the comics audience,” she said. Some came only to see R. Crumb, bypassing the earlier work, and others sped up at the end, but, for the most part, people accepted the history for the continuum it is.

And then there was the group of the hippest narrative artists — zine producers invited to a tailored event — who all said, “We just can’t believe we’re here.”